Cash-flow areas that also have the potential for capital growth?

[Michael Stubbs]

I am an out-of-state investor looking for the best of both worlds: high cash-flow properties that also have the potential for capital growth.

Does anyone know of new universities under construction, or other infrastructure projects that are likely to boost values in a high-cash-flow area?

Or have another thesis as to why some particular high-cash-flow area is about to experience capital growth?

My budget is 300k, but no deal is too small.

[David Faulkner]

So, your plan is to find and purchase a cheap property (those are the kind of properties that have high day 1 cash flow), with no prior history of appreciation (which is why it is cheap), that would magically start appreciating rapidly the day after you close escrow? I wish you luck with that.

Forced appreciation is as close as you can get to guaranteed, but you can only do it once per property. Market appreciation is the gift that keeps on giving, but markets rarely change their stripes over time, so the appreciation markets typically already have a history of appreciation in place, and are therefore more expensive and therefore do not cash flow as well on day 1.

If you invest for cash flow and you are right, you get cash flow (in the short run). If you invest for appreciation and you are right, you get BOTH appreciation AND cash flow (in the long run) ... price and rent increases go hand in, though most expenses do not scale as such. If you couple in forced appreciation in properties in such markets, then you get both short and long term profits.

If you try to invest for both right off the bat, well that is a unicorn hunt as described above ... you are far more likely to find a snake oil salesman con man staple a horn on the head of a donkey and sell it off to a unicorn, and since you believe in fairytales you will believe him as he tells you whatever you want to hear just to make the sale.

A skilled RE operator can make great profit in either type of market, but you give up too much control as a newbie going out of state, so your best bet is to work with the opportunities that your local market has to offer and learn to invest hands on and local rather than chasing out of state unicorns.

Am I being too subtle?